Waldron on Terrorism, Words, and Asymmetric Warfare @JeremyWaldron @nyulaw

Jeremy Waldron, NYU School of Law, has published Terrorism, Words, and Asymmetric Warfare as NYU School of Law, Public Law Research Paper No. 21-52. Here is the abstract.

Classic examples of terrorism involve murderous attacks on innocent civilians. But what about attacks on military forces, such as the USS Cole attack or the 1983 Marine Barracks attack or, for that matter, the 9/11 attack on the Pentagon? It is tempting to say that calling these attacks "terrorism" represents a cynical extension of the term for political purposes. In this paper, however, I argue that calling such attacks instances of terrorism can be justified by lines of thought that engage with multiple ways in which the fate of military personnel can affect the terrorization and insecurity of civilians. The paper explores five such lines of thought. The idea is not to preclude the view that the extension of the use of "terrorism" is cynical. It often is. But that is not the only possible explanation.

Download the article from SSRN at the link.

Contemporary Aesthetics: Special Volume--New Deadline For Articles October 31, 2018

Contemporary Aesthetics
Special Volume on “Aesthetics and Terrorism”
NEW deadline: October 31, 2018
Contact: emmareto@enl.uoa.gr.

Terrorism is unfortunately ubiquitous in the contemporary world. In the post-9/11 era, so-called “political violence” in the form of state or anti-state activity has placed itself at the very center of international politics and policies. But, of course, terrorist violence is not a recent phenomenon; rather, it has always preoccupied the minds of authorities, shattered the every-day routines of citizens, victimized thousands of people, but at the same time intrigued or even fascinated humanity with its unpredictability and suddenness. Through this lens, it is not paradoxical to admit that terrorism looms large in the artistic, literary, and philosophical imagination, and also in aesthetic debates. Although it may at first sound oxymoronic to articulate the concepts of terrorism and aesthetics in a single breath, not only is extreme political violence against (usually) non-combatants relevant to aesthetic matters and preoccupations, but it turns out that there may even be a structural link between the two. Aesthetics, here, does not necessarily hinge upon the question of beauty or artistic representation, but is more broadly defined as aesthetic experience understood as sense perception. In such a context, aesthetic sensibility has a lot to say about how terrorism is represented, employed, disseminated, reproduced, or even opposed.

Contemporary Aesthetics invites original, innovative, full-length articles that explore the connection between aesthetics and terrorism or terror across cultures, ages, genres, or discourses. CA welcome submissions on topics related (but not limited) to the following:

Aesthetic Theories, Political Violence, and the Philosophy of Terror

The Aesthetics of Suicide Attacks/Terrorism and the Body

The Politics of Aesthetics (or Aesthetics of Politics) in Terror(ism)

Radicalization as an Aesthetic Posture

Post-9/11 Political Discourse and Aesthetics

Ethics, Aesthetics, Narrativity in the Media Communication of Terror

Terrorist Discourse and the Sensorial Aspects of Terrorist Communication

Terrorism through the Perspective of Art (in its widest sense)

Morality, Ethics and Aesthetics in the Artistic Representation of Terror

Terrorism as Theatre/Performance

Society and the Cultural Imaginary of Terrorism

Counter-Terrorism, Law and Aesthetics

Urban Defense, Architecture and (Counter)Terrorism

Terrorism, Aesthetics and Ecological Consciousness

Postcolonial Aesthetics, Imagination and Terror

Religious (or not) Terrorism and the Aesthetics of Pain/Suffering

Aesthetics, Terror, Culture, and the 21st Century

Length: maximum 7,000 words, including abstract and notes. Only electronic submissions are acceptable. Deadline for submitting the full article and a short CV is October 31, 2018.

The article should be attached (as a word document) to your e-mail and sent to the guest editor,

Dr. Emmanouil Aretoulakis, emmareto@enl.uoa.gr.

For submission guidelines, see:
contempaesthetics.org
Guidelines for Article Submission
Please review the following topics in preparing your article for submission. If you have any questions or if you need assistance, please feel free to contact CA.

Corbin on Picturing Terrorists: "Always Muslim But Never White" @CarolineMCorbin

Caroline Mala Corbin, University of Miami School of Law, is publishing 'Terrorists are Always Muslim But Never White': At the Intersection of Critical Race Theory and Propaganda in the Fordham Law Review. Here is the abstract.

When you hear the word “terrorist,” who do you picture? Chances are, it was not a white person. In the United States, two common though false narratives about terrorists who attack America abound. We see them on television, in the movies, on the news, and, currently, in the Trump Administration. The first is that “terrorists are always (brown) Muslims.” The second is that “white people are never terrorists.” Different strands of critical race theory can help us understand these two narratives. One strand examines the role of unconscious cognitive biases in the production of stereotypes, such as the stereotype of the “Muslim terrorist.” Another strand focuses on white privilege, such as the privilege of avoiding the terrorist label. These false narratives play a crucial role in Trump’s propaganda. As the critical race analysis uncovers, these two narratives dovetail with two constituent parts of propaganda: flawed ideologies and aspirational myths. Propaganda relies on pre-existing false ideologies, which is another way to describe racist stereotyping. Propaganda also relies on certain ideals and myths, in this case, the myth of white innocence and white superiority. Thus, the Trump Administration’s intentional invocation of both narratives amounts to propaganda in more than just the colloquial sense. Part I illustrates each of the two narratives. Part II analyzes them through a critical race lens, showing how they map onto two strands of critical race theory. Part III examines how these narratives simultaneously enable and comprise propaganda. Finally, Part IV argues that the propagation of these false narratives hurts the nation’s security.

Download the essay from SSRN at the link.

Forthcoming From Palgrave/Macmillan: Juries, Science, and Popular Culture In the Age of Terror: The Case of the Sydney Bomber

Forthcoming in December: Juries, Science and Popular Culture in the Age of Terror: The Case of the Sydney Bomber (David Tait and Jane Goodman-Delahunty, eds., Palgrave-Macmillan, 2016). David Tait is a professor at Western Sydney University, Australia. Jane Goodman-Delahunty is a professor at Charles Sturt University, Australia. Here from the publisher's website is a description of the book's contents.

Terrorism has become an everyday reality in most contemporary societies. In a context of heightened fear can juries be trusted to remain impartial when confronted by defendants charged with terrorism? Do they scrutinize prosecution cases carefully, or does emotion trump reason once the spectre of terrorism is invoked? This book examines these questions from a range of disciplinary perspectives. The authors look at the how jurors in terrorism trials are likely to respond to gruesome evidence, including beheading videos. The 'CSI effect' is examined as a possible response to forensic evidence, and jurors with different learning preferences are compared. Virtual interactive environments, built like computer games, may be created to provide animated reconstructions of the prosecution or defence case. This book reports on how to create such presentations, culminating in the analysis of a live simulated trial using interactive visual displays followed by jury deliberations. The team of international, transdisciplinary experts draw conclusions of global legal and political significance, and contribute to the growing scholarship on comparative counter-terrorism law. The book will be of great interest to scholars, students and practitioners of law, criminal justice, forensic science and psychology.

Joyce and Simm on Zero Dark Thirty, International Law, and Film

Daniel Joyce, Lecturer, UNSW Australia, Faculty of Law, and Affiliated Research Fellow, Erik Castren Institute of International Law and Human Rights, University of Helsinki, and Gabrielle Simm, Chancellor's Postdoctoral Research Fellow, University of Technology, Sydney, Faculty of Law, and Visiting Fellow, Australian Human Rights Centre, UNSW Australia Faculty of Law, have published Zero Dark Thirty: International Law, Film, and Representation at 3 London Review of International Law 295 (2015). Here is the abstract.

This article explores the relationship between film and international law by reference to the feature film Zero Dark Thirty (2012). The authors examine this film in the context of international law, while also considering related questions of genre, torture, gender and targeted killing.

The full text is available by subscription.

Prosecuting and Defending "Enemies of the State"

Carole I. McCartney, Northumbria University; University of Leeds, School of Law; Bond University; and Clive Walker, University of Leeds, Centre for Criminal Justice Studies, have published Enemies of the State and Miscarriages of Justice at 32 Delhi Law Review 17 (2014). Here is the abstract.

Miscarriages of justice are exceptionally prevalent, acute and most often irredeemable when the subject is ‘an enemy of the state’. Nowadays, these subjects usually take the guise of ‘terrorists’ or other variants of ‘extremists’, and the impacts of the miscarriages upon them can be extreme, including the death penalty. Evidence will be provided for this premise mainly from the United Kingdom, but with further examples from other jurisdictions. Reasons for this correlation will be considered. One response is to demand the observance of fundamental rights within the justice process even in times of crisis and threat. In fact, states frequently adopt processes, which diminish normal safeguards and checks against wrongful conviction in such cases. Therefore, given the predilection of states to dilute due process in terrorist/extremist cases, a more practicable remedy might be to concentrate on post-conviction review mechanisms.

Download the article from SSRN at the link.

The Definitions of Terrorism

Ben Saul, University of Sydney Faculty of Law, is publishing Defining Terrorism: A Conceptual Minefield in The Oxford Handbook of Terrorism (A. Gofas, R. English, S. N. Kalyvas, and E. Chnoweth, eds., Oxford University Press, 2016). Here is the abstract.

Calls to define ‘terrorism’ as a legal concept arose in the context of efforts to extradite ‘political offenders’ from the 1930s onwards, with many efforts, over 80 years to the present, to define, criminalize, and depoliticise a common global concept of ‘terrorism’. Those international efforts remain largely unsuccessful to this day. After the terrorist attacks on the United States of 11 September 2001 (‘9/11’), many states enacted ‘terrorism’ offences, spurred on by the perceived threat of global religious terrorism, obligations imposed by the UN Security Council, gaps in existing criminal liabilities and police powers, and the expressive function of stigmatising terrorism as a special kind of violence against public interests. National laws remain, however, startlingly diverse and there is still a global divergence. At the international level, there is certainly a basic legal consensus that terrorism is criminal violence intended to intimidate a population or coerce a government or international organisation; some national laws add an ulterior intention to pursue a political, religious or ideological cause. There remain intense moral and political disagreements, however, on whether there should be exceptions for just causes (such as liberation violence and rebellion), armed conflicts, and state violence. As a result, a conceptual impasse continues, even if agreement has been edging closer.

Download the essay from SSRN at the link.

The Sense of Injustice and the Origins of Terrorism

Michael Shermer on capuchin monkeys, scientists, the sense of injustice, and terrorism, here, for Scientific American.